They both exist for less than a second before decaying into lighter atoms, but they bring researchers a step closer to making even heavier elements that are predicted to be stable for decades or longer, forming a fabled "island of stability" in the periodic table. Evidence for the two elements has been mounting for years.
570-Million-Year-Old Fossils Hint at Origins of Animal Kingdom. New research suggests that fossils thought to represent some of the earliest multicellular life are instead single-celled, amoeba-like organisms.

But even if they’re not quite full-blown animals, they may hint at how animals came into being. The 570-million-year-old Doushanto formation, first unearthed in South China in 1998, contains tiny clusters of cells that look similar to animal embryos. During the embryo stage of life, cells become organized into tissues and organs, one of the hallmarks of all animal species. Using a technique called x-ray tomographic microscopy, researchers captured an unprecedented level of detail in the Doushanto fossils, imaging internal and external features down to a ten-thousandth of an inch.

An analysis of the relationships between 43,000 transnational corporations has identified a relatively small group of companies, mainly banks, with disproportionate power over the global economy. The study's assumptions have attracted some criticism, but complex systems analysts contacted by New Scientist say it is a unique effort to untangle control in the global economy. Pushing the analysis further, they say, could help to identify ways of making global capitalism more stable. The idea that a few bankers control a large chunk of the global economy might not seem like news to New York's Occupy Wall Street movement and protesters elsewhere (see photo).
A Long Walk To Land. Long before Darwin published The Origin of Species, there was talk of evolution.

The more acquainted naturalists became with the major groups of animals, the gaps between them grew smaller. Once it seemed as if mammals were profoundly different than other vertebrates, for example. And then European explorers encountered the platypus, a mammal that laid eggs. Perhaps the major groups of animals had not been separately created, some naturalists suggested. Perhaps life had changed over time.
The sharp eyes of Anomalocaris, a top predator that lived half a billion years ago. Before killer whales and polar bears, before sharks and tyrannosaurs, the world’s top predator was probably a bizarre animal called Anomalocaris.

It lived in the Cambrian period, over half a billion years ago, when life was confined to the seas and animals took on bizarre shapes that haven’t been seen since. Many scientists believe that Anomalocaris ruled this primordial world as a top predator. At up to a metre in length, it was the largest hunter of its time. It chased after prey with undulating flaps on its sides and a large fan-shaped tail. It grabbed at them with large spiked arms.
First ancient proteome revealed. Mammoth bones have yielded proteins that could help to elucidate the animals' evolutionary history.

An international group of scientists has managed to identify 126 distinct protein sequences from a 43,000-year old bone from a woolly mammoth ( ). The study, in the 1 , unleashes the field of palaeoproteomics by identifying prehistoric protein sequences that could be used to help identify species, evolutionary relationships and even, perhaps, ancient diseases.

Proteomic analysis could therefore be used as an alternative to DNA analysis in samples that are too degraded to contain any genetic material. Protein sequences have previously been published for dinosaur fossils, including a 68-million-year-old 2 and an 80-million-year-old hadrosaur 3 , but the results have proved controversial (see Origin of ‘ ’ protein questioned ).
Wired.com. First Superpredator Had Enormous Eyes on Stalks. (Credit: Katrina Kenny, University of Adelaide) The world's first superpredator was a giant crustacean with enormous eyes and a razor sharp mouth, according to a new study in the journal Nature.

Ongoing debate about the composition of Turkey's top scientific institute is more than just academic, according to a respected conservation biologist. He argues that changes to the membership of the Turkish Academy of Sciences (TÜBA) are emblematic of the problems plaguing environmental policy-making as well. The Turkish government's decision earlier this year to appoint TÜBA members (who were previously selected by their peers) has prompted many scholars to resign, saying the academy's independence has been threatened. Critics of the move also charge that the decision was made "without explanation or any public debate," as Dr. Çağan Hakkı Şekercioğlu wrote in today's edition of Science.

A celestial visitor, seen from space. I know I post a lot of pictures I describe as amazing, lovely, breath-taking, jaw-dropping… but that’s only because it’s always true.

In this case, though, I think those adjectives fall way, way short in describing the seriously paralyzing beauty of this photograph: Comet Lovejoy, as seen by an astronaut on board the International Space Station: [Click to encomanate -- and yes. you need to.]
A New Hominin – A. sediba. Following the branching bush of human evolution is getting increasingly difficult. When I studied human evolution in college, things were much simpler. There were a few Australopithecus species followed by a few Homo species, leading to modern humans. It was recognized at the time that these fossil species probably did not represent a nice clean straight line to Homo sapiens, but it seems the family tree has become much bushier than was imagined at the time. Here is a recent representation of the hominin family tree.
RNA dynamics deconstructed.

RNA plays a critical role in directing the creation of proteins, but there is more to the life of an RNA molecule than simply carrying DNA’s message. One can imagine that an RNA molecule is born, matures, and, eventually, meets its demise. Researchers at the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT have developed an approach that offers many windows into the life cycle of these essential molecules and will enable other scientists to investigate what happens when something in a cell goes wrong.

They describe their approach, which offers high resolution and a comprehensive scope, in a Nature Biotechnology article published online on April 24. “People are discovering more and more how the RNA life cycle is at the heart of problems we see in disease, but we actually understand a lot less about it than we understand about many other cellular processes,” said Aviv Regev, a core faculty member of the Broad Institute and a co-senior author on the paper.
Box jellyfish stable-eyes vision to hunt prey : Neurophilosophy.

Ernst Haeckel’s Kunstformen der Natur (Artforms of Nature) was a landmark in biological illustration. Published in 1904, it was lavishly illustrated with 100 exquisitely detailed lithographic plates, including this one, showing nine different species of cubomedusae, or box jellyfish. It has been known, since around the time that Haeckel’s masterpiece was published, that box jellyfish have a unique visual system which is more sophisticated than that of other jellyfish species.
Protein flaws responsible for complex life, study says. 19 May 2011Last updated at 09:13 By Jason Palmer Science and technology reporter, BBC News Some proteins have remained largely unchanged since they first appeared Tiny structural errors in proteins may have been responsible for changes that sparked complex life, researchers say.

A comparison of proteins across 36 modern species suggests that protein flaws called "dehydrons" may have made proteins less stable in water.
Mammals first evolved big brains for better sense of smell. Friday, May 20, 2011 CT scans of modern short-tailed opossum (upper left) and Hadrocodium (bottom right) brains (pink) through cut-away skulls. Olfactory bulbs are at front of brain (reddish pink). Credit: Matt Colbert, Univ. of Texas at Austin.
Turkey opens restaurant for vultures. Ancient primate fossil unearthed. ?Doğanın ücretsiz ekosistem hizmetlerini yok edersek, medeniyetler de çöker?
Human Ancestors in Eurasia Earlier than Thought. Jellyfish Blooms Increase Carbon Emissions, Upend Marine Food Webs. The challenge of microbial diversity: Out on a limb. Two Ultraheavy Elements Added to Periodic Table. Australopithecus sediba may be an ancestor of modern humans.

Three new bat species discovered in Indochina. Scientists discover 12 new frog species in India. Mouse Genomes Catalogued. Fossil eyes show wraparound three-dimensional vision, half a billion years ago. Early hunters killed mastodons with mastodons (Also, you can chuck a bone spear through a car. Who knew?)
Near-perfect young Dinosaur fossil found in Bavaria. The world’s longest cells? Speculations on the nervous systems of sauropods « Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week. 1118669109.full. The eyes have it – incredible ways of seeing the world. New “Evil Spirit” Dino Bridges Evolutionary Gap. Modern humans in Arabia >100,000 years ago. First Wolves Tagged for GPS Tracking in Turkey.